On 11/25/09, Richard Bennett <richard [at] bennett> wrote: > It turns out you can say any damn thing you want about peering since > nobody has any facts.

Indeed you can. This is one of things where the people with the hard facts aren't talking due to NDA, regard for their pride, or both. In the absence of solid data, most journalists (and I use the term loosely) take the high road, writing on only what they know about and can back up with fact. It is unfortunate that you approach this differently, attempting to pass off Bill Norton's blog, itself very flawed and comprised of error upon error which he simply refuses to acknowledge or correct, as the new gospel.

You write that "the shift of an enormous amount of Internet traffic from transit to paid peering is new, thatís what the data in the Arbor Networks study shows". Nowhere in the Arbor study is there any analysis of where money is passing hands, or any settlement-based vs. settlement-free interconnection arrangement. The report is a scientific one based upon aggregated netflow/sflow data, which doesn't take layers 8 and above into account.

Also suspiciously absent is any disclosure of employer affiliations and biases. You write that "[you're] opposed to the anti-discrimination rule that the FCC is considering". What you fail to mention is that you work for the ITIF, a Washington think-tank allegedly funded by big cable. Is it really any surprise that you want to preserve this revenue stream?

Likewise, Norton neglects to mention that he works for NuMetra, a company going around to content and broadband operators trying to pitch a some black box which will enforce last-mile QoS and automatically pay the friendly local Internet monopoly/duopoly in "settlement" fees *on top* of your regular transit costs. Of course he wants Uncle Sam to back off; that's how his employer benefits. It is also important to consider Mr. Norton's role in Equinix, where he worked in MARKETING, far distanced from the establishment of actual peering agreements. The real co-founders were Jay Adelson and Al Avery.

It is sad to see that Mr. Norton, once a valued member of the community, so blatantly favoring the green stuff over fact-checking and journalistic integrity. One can only hope Om Malik will carry out better due diligence in the future when hiring "industry experts" to write for him.

Speculation about how the money flows is a worthwhile activity. Paul Wall wrote:

On 11/25/09, Richard Bennett [1]<richard [at] bennett> wrote:

It turns out you can say any damn thing you want about peering since nobody has any facts.

Indeed you can. This is one of things where the people with the hard facts aren't talking due to NDA, regard for their pride, or both. In the absence of solid data, most journalists (and I use the term loosely) take the high road, writing on only what they know about and can back up with fact. It is unfortunate that you approach this differently, attempting to pass off Bill Norton's blog, itself very flawed and comprised of error upon error which he simply refuses to acknowledge or correct, as the new gospel.

You write that "the shift of an enormous amount of Internet traffic from transit to paid peering is new, that's what the data in the Arbor Networks study shows". Nowhere in the Arbor study is there any analysis of where money is passing hands, or any settlement-based vs. settlement-free interconnection arrangement. The report is a scientific one based upon aggregated netflow/sflow data, which doesn't take layers 8 and above into account.

Also suspiciously absent is any disclosure of employer affiliations and biases. You write that "[you're] opposed to the anti-discrimination rule that the FCC is considering". What you fail to mention is that you work for the ITIF, a Washington think-tank allegedly funded by big cable. Is it really any surprise that you want to preserve this revenue stream?

Likewise, Norton neglects to mention that he works for NuMetra, a company going around to content and broadband operators trying to pitch a some black box which will enforce last-mile QoS and automatically pay the friendly local Internet monopoly/duopoly in "settlement" fees *on top* of your regular transit costs. Of course he wants Uncle Sam to back off; that's how his employer benefits. It is also important to consider Mr. Norton's role in Equinix, where he worked in MARKETING, far distanced from the establishment of actual peering agreements. The real co-founders were Jay Adelson and Al Avery.

It is sad to see that Mr. Norton, once a valued member of the community, so blatantly favoring the green stuff over fact-checking and journalistic integrity. One can only hope Om Malik will carry out better due diligence in the future when hiring "industry experts" to write for him.

Of course, the FCC/FTC could always get involved and mandate full disclosure and peering neutrality.

That might be fun.

RB

Richard Bennett wrote: > Speculation about how the money flows is a worthwhile activity. > Paul Wall wrote: > > On 11/25/09, Richard Bennett [1]<richard [at] bennett> wrote: > > It turns out you can say any damn thing you want about peering since > nobody has any facts. > > Indeed you can. This is one of things where the people with the hard > facts aren't talking due to NDA, regard for their pride, or both. In > the absence of solid data, most journalists (and I use the term > loosely) take the high road, writing on only what they know about and > can back up with fact. It is unfortunate that you approach this > differently, attempting to pass off Bill Norton's blog, itself very > flawed and comprised of error upon error which he simply refuses to > acknowledge or correct, as the new gospel. > > You write that "the shift of an enormous amount of Internet traffic > from transit to paid peering is new, that's what the data in the Arbor > Networks study shows". Nowhere in the Arbor study is there any > analysis of where money is passing hands, or any settlement-based vs. > settlement-free interconnection arrangement. The report is a > scientific one based upon aggregated netflow/sflow data, which doesn't > take layers 8 and above into account. > > Also suspiciously absent is any disclosure of employer affiliations > and biases. You write that "[you're] opposed to the > anti-discrimination rule that the FCC is considering". What you > fail to mention is that you work for the ITIF, a Washington think-tank > allegedly funded by big cable. Is it really any surprise that you > want to preserve this revenue stream? > > Likewise, Norton neglects to mention that he works for NuMetra, a > company going around to content and broadband operators trying to > pitch a some black box which will enforce last-mile QoS and > automatically pay the friendly local Internet monopoly/duopoly in > "settlement" fees *on top* of your regular transit costs. Of course > he wants Uncle Sam to back off; that's how his employer benefits. It > is also important to consider Mr. Norton's role in Equinix, where he > worked in MARKETING, far distanced from the establishment of actual > peering agreements. The real co-founders were Jay Adelson and Al Avery. > > It is sad to see that Mr. Norton, once a valued member of the > community, so blatantly favoring the green stuff over fact-checking > and journalistic integrity. One can only hope Om Malik will carry out > better due diligence in the future when hiring "industry experts" to > write for him. > > Drive Slow, > Paul Wall > > -- > Richard Bennett > Research Fellow > Information Technology and Innovation Foundation > Washington, DC > > References > > 1. mailto:richard [at] bennett >

and in the absence of source routing, why would I care what happens past the first hop? to the extent I can know, document, and prove my internal network and its connectivity to its peers, that becomes the item of value, the reputation of the network and its treatment of its peers, clients and providers.

and the funny thing about reputation. its so hard to build a good one and so easy to lose. the second odd thing about reputation, its nearly impossible to quantify.

--bill (pre-dating norton and woodcock in the peering game)

On Tue, Nov 24, 2009 at 10:00:52PM -0800, Richard Bennett wrote: > I haven't found a good source who knows what's going on outside his own > network. > Randy Bush wrote: > > not really. it's just that those with the facts have no reason to blab > them and reasons not to do so. > > randy > > -- > Richard Bennett

On Tue, Nov 24, 2009 at 10:00:52PM -0800, Richard Bennett wrote: > I haven't found a good source who knows what's going on outside his own > network.

Mr. Bennett,

You know when I first read your post, I assumed you were just ignorant and confused about the topic of peering on the Internet. Then I saw you actively refusing to listen to intelligent feedback by some of the most experienced network operators and peering managers in the industry, dismiss any idea that you didn't agree with as part of the "Google conspiracy", and further embarrass yourself with comments which proved you lacked understanding of even the most basic concepts of peering or inter-network traffic exchange. Normally I would just write you off as another Dean Anderson style nutjob, but I'm afraid that your ramblings are so wrong and your closed-mindedness is so severe that you are actually dangerous to anyone who might happen to read your comments and think that they are in any way correct. Therefore, I think it is important for all of us that you be refuted.

I'll start with a few points from your post and comments. You said:

> I'm not sure that your 'on-net routes' is the same product as the Paid > Peering that Norton is interpreting; the Arbor study found a large > increase in the traffic that moves through these transit bypass paths, > and that's the actual story. While this service may have been > available for a while, its use is radically increasing. That's data, > BTW, not anecdote, so if you have a problem with the Arbor data, > you'll need some data of your own to refute it.

For starters, if you aren't sure what "on-net routes" and "paid peering" even are, maybe you shouldn't be trying to comment on them. Second, the Arbor study said absolutely NOTHING about an increase in traffic that moves via peering vs transit, to say nothing of paid vs settlement free peering. Arbor is completely and totally unable to identify anything about money exchanged for bits in general, and from a technical perspective there is absolute no difference between a paid and non-paid peering.

You seem to be convoluting the purported "increase in traffic between tier 2 networks" with a completely absurd belief that all traffic between tier 1's was transit and all traffic between tier 2's is peering. In reality, tier 2's routinely buy from and sell to each other, peer with some tier 1's, and sell paid peering between themselves when the business opportunities arise.

You later go on to state:

> The Arbor study is evidence that traffic is shifting, and the > carrier-neutral peering site managers I've spoken with tell me they're > making something like 300 cross-connects a month. Do you think all > those cross-connnects are implementing settlement-free peering or > conventional transit agreements? I'm surmising that they aren't.

You have absolutely no basis to make the determination about what percentage of the crossconnects are peering and what percentage are transit. This is what we tried to explain to you with the "you can't know this about any network but your own" answer, which you seemed completely incapable of understanding. The reality is that no one can know the answer for anything but themselves. For my network, I'd say much less than 20% of our crossconnects are peering, with the vast majority being customers, and a significant amount being intra-network capacity (intra-pop, metro, and long-haul circuits) and transit. The number may vary between networks, but again you have absolutely zero basis to make any kind of claim about peering let alone settlement-free vs paid based on the number of crossconnects in a colo.

Most of the other arguments are either meaningless or fall apart once you remove some of the fundamental misunderstandings above, but there are still plenty of other things which are completely absurd. For example, you said:

> Paid peering is a better level of access to an ISP's customers for a > fee, but the fee is less than the price of generic access to the ISP > via a transit network. The practice of paid peering also reduces the > load on the Internet core, so what's not to like? Paid peering > agreements should be offered for sale on a non-discriminatory basis, > but they certainly shouldn't be banned.

Paid peering (or peering of any kind) is absolutely no guarantee of "better" access to any network, nor is it guaranteed (or even likely) to reduce costs. There is also no such thing as "load on the Internet core" to reduce, and this further illustrates a complete failure to understand how the Internet works in general.

Paid peering is simply another form of transit, where two networks agree to exchange money for the service of delivering connectivity. The only difference is that you're only selling a portion of the routing table rather than the "whole thing", for a specific subset of routes which have different properties than the rest. In the case of paid peering, the different property is that you'll get to bill your customer on the other side for the traffic, thus allowing you to "double dip" for the same bit and potentially make more money.

Of course in practice it doesn't work this way at all. The vast majority of the cost of operating a network is transporting the bits from one place to another, and when you sell paid peering you are guaranteed that the traffic is going to stay on your network and be hauled. This makes it some of the most expensive traffic to deliver, and typically results in prices which are higher than those of another network who is hot potatoing those bits off their network in one location, and who is sending the traffic to a settlement-free peer. There is nothing wrong with paid peering, it often has a time and a place (such as when two networks are close to being settlement-free peers, but not quite, and someone needs to sweeten the deal a little bit), but it is not the panacea you think it is. Of course nobody else seems to think the FCC Question 106 is talking about regulating paid peering (which would be absurd), so fortunately I don't think we have anything to worry about.

Of course all of these points (and more) were already quite elegantly expressed by fine folks like Vijay Gill, Dan Golding, Patrick Gilmore, Joe Provo, and others. They tried to help correct your misinformation with free advice, and you repaid them with delusional rants. Now you simply look like a fool to everyone.

I haven't found a good source who knows what's going on outside his own network.

Mr. Bennett,

You know when I first read your post, I assumed you were just ignorant and confused about the topic of peering on the Internet. Then I saw you actively refusing to listen to intelligent feedback by some of the most experienced network operators and peering managers in the industry, dismiss any idea that you didn't agree with as part of the "Google conspiracy", and further embarrass yourself with comments which proved you lacked understanding of even the most basic concepts of peering or inter-network traffic exchange. Normally I would just write you off as another Dean Anderson style nutjob, but I'm afraid that your ramblings are so wrong and your closed-mindedness is so severe that you are actually dangerous to anyone who might happen to read your comments and think that they are in any way correct. Therefore, I think it is important for all of us that you be refuted.

I'll start with a few points from your post and comments. You said:

I'm not sure that your 'on-net routes' is the same product as the Paid Peering that Norton is interpreting; the Arbor study found a large increase in the traffic that moves through these transit bypass paths, and that's the actual story. While this service may have been available for a while, its use is radically increasing. That's data, BTW, not anecdote, so if you have a problem with the Arbor data, you'll need some data of your own to refute it.

For starters, if you aren't sure what "on-net routes" and "paid peering" even are, maybe you shouldn't be trying to comment on them. Second, the Arbor study said absolutely NOTHING about an increase in traffic that moves via peering vs transit, to say nothing of paid vs settlement free peering. Arbor is completely and totally unable to identify anything about money exchanged for bits in general, and from a technical perspective there is absolute no difference between a paid and non-paid peering.

You seem to be convoluting the purported "increase in traffic between tier 2 networks" with a completely absurd belief that all traffic between tier 1's was transit and all traffic between tier 2's is peering. In reality, tier 2's routinely buy from and sell to each other, peer with some tier 1's, and sell paid peering between themselves when the business opportunities arise.

You later go on to state:

The Arbor study is evidence that traffic is shifting, and the carrier-neutral peering site managers I've spoken with tell me they're making something like 300 cross-connects a month. Do you think all those cross-connnects are implementing settlement-free peering or conventional transit agreements? I'm surmising that they aren't.

You have absolutely no basis to make the determination about what percentage of the crossconnects are peering and what percentage are transit. This is what we tried to explain to you with the "you can't know this about any network but your own" answer, which you seemed completely incapable of understanding. The reality is that no one can know the answer for anything but themselves. For my network, I'd say much less than 20% of our crossconnects are peering, with the vast majority being customers, and a significant amount being intra-network capacity (intra-pop, metro, and long-haul circuits) and transit. The number may vary between networks, but again you have absolutely zero basis to make any kind of claim about peering let alone settlement-free vs paid based on the number of crossconnects in a colo.

Most of the other arguments are either meaningless or fall apart once you remove some of the fundamental misunderstandings above, but there are still plenty of other things which are completely absurd. For example, you said:

Paid peering is a better level of access to an ISP's customers for a fee, but the fee is less than the price of generic access to the ISP via a transit network. The practice of paid peering also reduces the load on the Internet core, so what's not to like? Paid peering agreements should be offered for sale on a non-discriminatory basis, but they certainly shouldn't be banned.

Paid peering (or peering of any kind) is absolutely no guarantee of "better" access to any network, nor is it guaranteed (or even likely) to reduce costs. There is also no such thing as "load on the Internet core" to reduce, and this further illustrates a complete failure to understand how the Internet works in general.

Paid peering is simply another form of transit, where two networks agree to exchange money for the service of delivering connectivity. The only difference is that you're only selling a portion of the routing table rather than the "whole thing", for a specific subset of routes which have different properties than the rest. In the case of paid peering, the different property is that you'll get to bill your customer on the other side for the traffic, thus allowing you to "double dip" for the same bit and potentially make more money.

Of course in practice it doesn't work this way at all. The vast majority of the cost of operating a network is transporting the bits from one place to another, and when you sell paid peering you are guaranteed that the traffic is going to stay on your network and be hauled. This makes it some of the most expensive traffic to deliver, and typically results in prices which are higher than those of another network who is hot potatoing those bits off their network in one location, and who is sending the traffic to a settlement-free peer. There is nothing wrong with paid peering, it often has a time and a place (such as when two networks are close to being settlement-free peers, but not quite, and someone needs to sweeten the deal a little bit), but it is not the panacea you think it is. Of course nobody else seems to think the FCC Question 106 is talking about regulating paid peering (which would be absurd), so fortunately I don't think we have anything to worry about.

Of course all of these points (and more) were already quite elegantly expressed by fine folks like Vijay Gill, Dan Golding, Patrick Gilmore, Joe Provo, and others. They tried to help correct your misinformation with free advice, and you repaid them with delusional rants. Now you simply look like a fool to everyone.

He claims to have been involved in IEEE Wi-Fi for 15 years. Meaning he's one of those responsible for the bad security (WEP, etc.), and the stagnation of ad hoc networking -- because the industry has a centralized solution they want to sell, customer be damned.

His bio also says he was vice-chair for the hub standard, so prevented jumbo frames from being formally adopted -- again, customer be damned.

Now, he works for a "think tank" called "Information Technology & Innovation Foundation". Basically, he goes to conferences. He's not responsible for operating any networks or doing any actual engineering.

ITIF doesn't give out information about its funding, which usually means it's industry lobbyist funded. Apparently in this case, big cable and probably big telco.

They're opposed to net neutrality, and (based on his comments and several of the papers) still think the Internet is some kind of bastard child that needs adult supervision in the middle -- by which they mean themselves /in loco parentis/.

Looking at the board, it's populated by ultra-conservative wing-nut Republicans, and some Conservadems (as we call them in political circles, they call themselves "centrists") from the "New Democrat Caucus" for "bi-partisan" cover. And lots of lobbyists -- Federal lobbyists -- who seem to list their educational clients on their bio, but not whether they are also employed by a firm that represents other clients....

Now you've descended from Steenbergen's hair-splitting between "on-net routes" (the mechanism) vs. "on-net access" (the actual product) into Simpson's straight-up lying. ITIF is not opposed to network neutrality in principle, having released a paper on "A Third Way on Network Neutrality", http://www.itif.org/index.php?id=63. There is not a single ultra-conservative on the ITIF board, they're all either moderate Democrats or moderate Republicans.

I'm letting most of this childish venting slide, but I will point out the bald-faced lies.

RB

William Allen Simpson wrote: > They're opposed to net neutrality, and (based on his comments and several > of the papers) still think the Internet is some kind of bastard child > that > needs adult supervision in the middle -- by which they mean themselves > /in loco parentis/. > > Looking at the board, it's populated by ultra-conservative wing-nut > Republicans, and some Conservadems (as we call them in political circles, > they call themselves "centrists") from the "New Democrat Caucus" for > "bi-partisan" cover. And lots of lobbyists -- Federal lobbyists -- who > seem to list their educational clients on their bio, but not whether > they are also employed by a firm that represents other clients....

If we're to continue this discussion, we need to establish bias and motive, which you've not covered on your own accord.

Drive Slow, Paul Wall

On 11/25/09, Richard Bennett <richard [at] bennett> wrote: > Now you've descended from Steenbergen's hair-splitting between "on-net > routes" (the mechanism) vs. "on-net access" (the actual product) into > Simpson's straight-up lying. ITIF is not opposed to network neutrality > in principle, having released a paper on "A Third Way on Network > Neutrality", http://www.itif.org/index.php?id=63. There is not a single > ultra-conservative on the ITIF board, they're all either moderate > Democrats or moderate Republicans. > > I'm letting most of this childish venting slide, but I will point out > the bald-faced lies. > > RB > > William Allen Simpson wrote: >> They're opposed to net neutrality, and (based on his comments and several >> of the papers) still think the Internet is some kind of bastard child >> that >> needs adult supervision in the middle -- by which they mean themselves >> /in loco parentis/. >> >> Looking at the board, it's populated by ultra-conservative wing-nut >> Republicans, and some Conservadems (as we call them in political circles, >> they call themselves "centrists") from the "New Democrat Caucus" for >> "bi-partisan" cover. And lots of lobbyists -- Federal lobbyists -- who >> seem to list their educational clients on their bio, but not whether >> they are also employed by a firm that represents other clients.... > > -- > Richard Bennett > Research Fellow > Information Technology and Innovation Foundation > Washington, DC > > >

Would you care to elaborate on how the investigation of someones funding sources is operationally relevant to the rest of the list?

Aaron Cossey aaron.cossey [at] gmail

On Wed, Nov 25, 2009 at 1:25 PM, Paul Wall <pauldotwall [at] gmail> wrote: > RB- > > Where can we find data on your group's funding sources? > > If we're to continue this discussion, we need to establish bias and > motive, which you've not covered on your own accord. > > Drive Slow, > Paul Wall > > On 11/25/09, Richard Bennett <richard [at] bennett> wrote: >> Now you've descended from Steenbergen's hair-splitting between "on-net >> routes" (the mechanism) vs. "on-net access" (the actual product) into >> Simpson's straight-up lying. ITIF is not opposed to network neutrality >> in principle, having released a paper on "A Third Way on Network >> Neutrality", http://www.itif.org/index.php?id=63. There is not a single >> ultra-conservative on the ITIF board, they're all either moderate >> Democrats or moderate Republicans. >> >> I'm letting most of this childish venting slide, but I will point out >> the bald-faced lies. >> >> RB >> >> William Allen Simpson wrote: >>> They're opposed to net neutrality, and (based on his comments and several >>> of the papers) still think the Internet is some kind of bastard child >>> that >>> needs adult supervision in the middle -- by which they mean themselves >>> /in loco parentis/. >>> >>> Looking at the board, it's populated by ultra-conservative wing-nut >>> Republicans, and some Conservadems (as we call them in political circles, >>> they call themselves "centrists") from the "New Democrat Caucus" for >>> "bi-partisan" cover. †And lots of lobbyists -- Federal lobbyists -- who >>> seem to list their educational clients on their bio, but not whether >>> they are also employed by a firm that represents other clients.... >> >> -- >> Richard Bennett >> Research Fellow >> Information Technology and Innovation Foundation >> Washington, DC >> >> >> > > -- > Sent from my mobile device > >

All of four paragraphs, which don't in fact address what the provider is or is not providing to Joe Sixpack - point 1 says discriminatory plans are OK as long as the discriminatory are on display in the cellar of the ISP office, with no stairs, in the bottom of a locked filing cabinet stuck in a disused lavatory with a sign on the door saying Beware of the Leopard.

And points 2 and 3 are saying that this should all be overseen by the same agencies that oversaw the previous decade's massive buildout of fiber to the home that was financed by massive multi-billion dollar incentives.

Oh wait, those billions got pocketed - if the massive fiber buildout had happened, we'd have so much bandwidth that neutrality wouldn't be an issue...

But then, the Republicans keep saying they are not opposed to health care reform in principle either...

> On Wed, 25 Nov 2009 03:32:02 PST, Richard Bennett said: > >> ITIF is not opposed to network neutrality >> in principle, having released a paper on "A Third Way on Network >> Neutrality", http://www.itif.org/index.php?id=63.> > All of four paragraphs, which don't in fact address what the provider is or is > not providing to Joe Sixpack - point 1 says discriminatory plans are OK as long > as the discriminatory are on display in the cellar of the ISP office, with no > stairs, in the bottom of a locked filing cabinet stuck in a disused lavatory > with a sign on the door saying Beware of the Leopard. > > And points 2 and 3 are saying that this should all be overseen by the same > agencies that oversaw the previous decade's massive buildout of fiber to the > home that was financed by massive multi-billion dollar incentives. > > Oh wait, those billions got pocketed - if the massive fiber buildout had > happened, we'd have so much bandwidth that neutrality wouldn't be an issue... > > But then, the Republicans keep saying they are not opposed to health care > reform in principle either... >

Me, I'm reminded of the fact that those on the edge of suburban areas have fewer choices than those in purely rural areas. Some carriers have been formed just to solve the basic telephony access issues of PSTN recently, eg:

All of four paragraphs, which don't in fact address what the provider is or is not providing to Joe Sixpack - point 1 says discriminatory plans are OK as long as the discriminatory are on display in the cellar of the ISP office, with no stairs, in the bottom of a locked filing cabinet stuck in a disused lavatory with a sign on the door saying Beware of the Leopard.

And points 2 and 3 are saying that this should all be overseen by the same agencies that oversaw the previous decade's massive buildout of fiber to the home that was financed by massive multi-billion dollar incentives.

Oh wait, those billions got pocketed - if the massive fiber buildout had happened, we'd have so much bandwidth that neutrality wouldn't be an issue...

But then, the Republicans keep saying they are not opposed to health care reform in principle either...

Whether or not Mr Bennett has any idea what he is talking about- and I have started to develop an opinion on that subject myself- I really would rather not see Nanog become a forum for partisan political discussion. There are _lots_ of places for that, which as a political junkie I read regularly.

I like Nanog in part because it typically steers clear of this sort of thing (and you know the mailing list charter sez....) and in some way serves as a refreshing change between reading Daily Kos and Powerline blogs.

I will also say that while Mr Bennett's affiliation and paycheck have some relevance to interpreting what he says, it isn't justification for tossing everything he says out. If he seems to have no idea what he is talking about, that is reason for tossing out what he says.

One final point- referring to conservadems is about as telling about perspective as certain people referring to RINO's. Bennett hasn't said anything blatantly partisan (perhaps he is to polished for that), his critics certainly have. You diminish your argument by doing so.

I say all this even though some of the people getting engaged in this are people I've known for a while and respect a great deal, and others are ones I've read on Nanog for a number of years.

I'm actually intersted in the substantive content, but I'd rather avoid the rest if you wouldn't mind.

Thanks for listening,

--D

On Wed, Nov 25, 2009 at 7:13 AM, <Valdis.Kletnieks [at] vt> wrote:

> On Wed, 25 Nov 2009 03:32:02 PST, Richard Bennett said: > > > ITIF is not opposed to network neutrality > > in principle, having released a paper on "A Third Way on Network > > Neutrality", http://www.itif.org/index.php?id=63.> > All of four paragraphs, which don't in fact address what the provider is or > is > not providing to Joe Sixpack - point 1 says discriminatory plans are OK as > long > as the discriminatory are on display in the cellar of the ISP office, with > no > stairs, in the bottom of a locked filing cabinet stuck in a disused > lavatory > with a sign on the door saying Beware of the Leopard. > > And points 2 and 3 are saying that this should all be overseen by the same > agencies that oversaw the previous decade's massive buildout of fiber to > the > home that was financed by massive multi-billion dollar incentives. > > Oh wait, those billions got pocketed - if the massive fiber buildout had > happened, we'd have so much bandwidth that neutrality wouldn't be an > issue... > > But then, the Republicans keep saying they are not opposed to health care > reform in principle either... > >

(pardon me if this message is not formatted correctly, T-bird doesn't like this list)

I agree that this is not the proper venue for discussion of the politics of Internet regulation; the post I wrote for GigaOm has comments enabled, and many people with an anti-capitalist bone to pick have already availed themselves of that forum to advocate for the people's revolution. There are some technical issues that might be of more interest and relevance to operators, however.

* One claim I made in my blog post is that traffic increases on the Internet aren't measured by MINTS very well. MINTS uses data from Meet-me switches, but IX's and colos are pulling x-connects like mad so more and more traffic is passing directly through the x-connects and therefore not being captured by MINTS. Rate of traffic increase is important for regulators as it relates to the cost of running an ISP and the need for traffic shaping. Seems to me that MINTS understates traffic growth, and people are dealing with it by lighting more dark fiber, pulling more fiber, and the x-connects are the tip of the iceberg that says this is going on.

* A number of people said I have no basis for the claim that paid peering is on the increase, and it's true that the empirical data is slim due to the secretive nature of peering and transit agreements. This claim is based on hearsay and on the observation that Comcast now has a nationwide network and a very open policy regarding peering and paid peering. So if paid peering is only increasing at Comcast, now a top 10 network, it's increasing overall.

* Some other people said I'm not entitled to have an opinion; so much for democracy and free speech.

I'd be glad to hear from anyone who has data or informed opinions on these subjects, on-list of off-. The reason you should share is that people in Washington and Brussels listen to me, so it's in everybody's interest for me to be well-informed; I don't really have an ax to grind one way or another, but I do want law and regulation to be based on fact, not speculation and ideology.

Thanks and have a nice day.

RB

Darren Bolding wrote: > Whether or not Mr Bennett has any idea what he is talking about- and I > have started to develop an opinion on that subject myself- I really > would rather not see Nanog become a forum for partisan political > discussion. There are _lots_ of places for that, which as a political > junkie I read regularly. > > I like Nanog in part because it typically steers clear of this sort of > thing (and you know the mailing list charter sez....) and in some way > serves as a refreshing change between reading Daily Kos and Powerline > blogs. > > I will also say that while Mr Bennett's affiliation and paycheck have > some relevance to interpreting what he says, it isn't justification > for tossing everything he says out. If he seems to have no idea what > he is talking about, that is reason for tossing out what he says. > > One final point- referring to conservadems is about as telling about > perspective as certain people referring to RINO's. Bennett hasn't > said anything blatantly partisan (perhaps he is to polished for that), > his critics certainly have. You diminish your argument by doing so. > > I say all this even though some of the people getting engaged in this > are people I've known for a while and respect a great deal, and others > are ones I've read on Nanog for a number of years. > > I'm actually intersted in the substantive content, but I'd rather > avoid the rest if you wouldn't mind. > > Thanks for listening, > > --D > > > On Wed, Nov 25, 2009 at 7:13 AM, <Valdis.Kletnieks [at] vt > <mailto:Valdis.Kletnieks [at] vt>> wrote: > > On Wed, 25 Nov 2009 03:32:02 PST, Richard Bennett said: > > > ITIF is not opposed to network neutrality > > in principle, having released a paper on "A Third Way on Network > > Neutrality", http://www.itif.org/index.php?id=63.> > All of four paragraphs, which don't in fact address what the > provider is or is > not providing to Joe Sixpack - point 1 says discriminatory plans > are OK as long > as the discriminatory are on display in the cellar of the ISP > office, with no > stairs, in the bottom of a locked filing cabinet stuck in a > disused lavatory > with a sign on the door saying Beware of the Leopard. > > And points 2 and 3 are saying that this should all be overseen by > the same > agencies that oversaw the previous decade's massive buildout of > fiber to the > home that was financed by massive multi-billion dollar incentives. > > Oh wait, those billions got pocketed - if the massive fiber > buildout had > happened, we'd have so much bandwidth that neutrality wouldn't be > an issue... > > But then, the Republicans keep saying they are not opposed to > health care > reform in principle either... > > > > > -- > -- Darren Bolding -- > -- darren [at] bolding <mailto:darren [at] bolding> --

On Wed, Nov 25, 2009 at 02:29:33PM -0800, Richard Bennett wrote: > (pardon me if this message is not formatted correctly, T-bird doesn't > like this list) > > I agree that this is not the proper venue for discussion of the > politics of Internet regulation; the post I wrote for GigaOm has > comments enabled, and many people with an anti-capitalist bone to pick > have already availed themselves of that forum to advocate for the > people's revolution. There are some technical issues that might be of > more interest and relevance to operators, however.

So now anyone who points out the massive flaws in your statements are part of an anti-capitalist movement? Any more conspiracy theories you'd like to put forward? I can't speak for anyone else, but personally I consider myself very pro-capitalism and it has absolutely no impact on how I feel about the blatantly wrong and baseless crap you are spewing.

> * One claim I made in my blog post is that traffic increases on the > Internet aren't measured by MINTS very well. MINTS uses data from > Meet-me switches, but IX's and colos are pulling x-connects like mad > so more and more traffic is passing directly through the x-connects > and therefore not being captured by MINTS. Rate of traffic increase is > important for regulators as it relates to the cost of running an ISP > and the need for traffic shaping. Seems to me that MINTS understates > traffic growth, and people are dealing with it by lighting more dark > fiber, pulling more fiber, and the x-connects are the tip of the > iceberg that says this is going on.

This is all completely irrelevent to everything else that has been discussed so far, but what the hell I'll bite. Traffic on the Internet is indeed growing rapidly, while the predominate technology for cost effectively interconnecting the vast majority of the bits (10 Gigabit Ethernet) has remained relatively static in recent years. Without a cost effective technology for interconnecting devices in > 10Gbps increments (40Gbps OC-768 has existed for a while, but is far more expensive than simply doing 4x10GbE), the only reasonable way to scale a network is to build your links out of Nx10G bundles. In places with reasonable crossconnect pricing, it is far cheaper to simply order multiple crossconnects than it is to pay for DWDM gear, and thus you see a rapid increase in fiber crossconnects.

> * A number of people said I have no basis for the claim that paid > peering is on the increase, and it's true that the empirical data is > slim due to the secretive nature of peering and transit agreements. > This claim is based on hearsay and on the observation that Comcast now > has a nationwide network and a very open policy regarding peering and > paid peering. So if paid peering is only increasing at Comcast, now a > top 10 network, it's increasing overall.

So in other words, you're admitting that you have absolutely no basis for your claim, and you're simply making it up based on indirect hearsay modified with your own ill-informed conclusions? First intelligent thing you've said so far.

If you actually bothered to ask anyone in the industry with experience dealing with Comcast, they would tell you that while Comcast initially entered the market primarily trying to sell paid peering, they have since switched their efforts to primarily selling full transit. There are only a certain number of networks who even know what to DO with a paid peering product, and a vastly larger number who know what to do with a transit product, so it makes perfect sense really.

> * Some other people said I'm not entitled to have an opinion; so much > for democracy and free speech.

You are not entitled to opine an opinion on a subject matter which you do not understand, without being called out for it. Sane and rational people understand when they are talking out their ass and are being corrected by knowledgable experts, and will shut the hell up and listen. Sadly this seems to be a skill you lack.

> I'd be glad to hear from anyone who has data or informed opinions on > these subjects, on-list of off-. The reason you should share is that > people in Washington and Brussels listen to me, so it's in everybody's > interest for me to be well-informed; I don't really have an ax to > grind one way or another, but I do want law and regulation to be based > on fact, not speculation and ideology.